Just wondering

Open my eyes so that I may see the wonders of your law. -Psalm 119:18

This verse from the longest psalm has been on my mind this Easter season. Fun fact (which gives you an idea of what clergy consider to be fun): Every one of the 176 verses in Psalm 119 includes a reference to the law, or teaching, or commandments, or statutes of God. It might be easy to hear those repeated references as promoting rule-based, grace-deprived theology.

But there’s another way to look at it. The references to law or teaching or statutes are really about God’s best intention for us, the way we are designed to walk and talk. This psalm offers a prayer that we will be able to see that, that we will appreciate its wonder. So think with me about that prayer to have eyes opened, a prayer for vision, for a new way of seeing, for a new set of lenses, for a new sense of wonder.

The Easter season is filled with stories of folks who have eyes opened with wonder. The four gospels present varied accounts of Jesus’ resurrection, but there is this recurrent theme: Folks don’t immediately see the miracle. They need to have eyes opened.

In her grief, Mary goes to the tomb on Easter morning (John 20), finds it empty, runs into Jesus, tears clouding vision, thinks he’s the gardener. It’s only when he says her name that her eyes are opened and sorrow turns to joy.

Thomas of doubting fame refuses to believe that Jesus is alive (John 20). It’s only when Jesus shows his wounds that Thomas’ eyes are opened. Doubt turns to worship, as Thomas says “My Lord and my God.”

Yesterday in church, we read about disciples on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24). Jesus joins them as they walk for miles. As they walk and talk, Jesus gives them a tutorial in the Hebrew Scriptures. They have no idea who he is. It’s only when he blesses and breaks bread that they have eyes opened and run to share good news.

Peter pushes his fishing boat off shore (John 21) catches nothing all night (I find it amusing that the gospel never records disciples, who were professional fishermen, catching a fish without Jesus’ help, a subject for another email.) Peter sees a stranger on the shore. It’s only when there’s a miraculous catch of fish that his eyes open to recognize the stranger as Jesus.

So what would it take for us to have eyes opened to God’s wondrous ways? Taking cues from the stories in the gospels, it begins by recognizing that God’s presence, Christ’s liveliness is closer than we might think. In the gospel accounts, grief or disappointment or anxiety or fear kept disciples behind locked doors, unable to realize that Christ was present and very much alive. And then their eyes were opened.

That can happen to us as well. Are we looking for where Christ is coming? Can our eyes be opened to see the wonder of God’s way in the world? Part of that new way of seeing has to do with our willingness to see what God is already up to in the neighborhood, to steal a phrase from Dr. Dwight Zscheile in his wonderful book, People of the Way. In the same way that disciples failed to recognize the risen Christ, so we often forget that Christ is present in each person, that God is active in all of creation, and in the whole world.

So join the psalmist and pray for that miracle to happen. Pray today for a sense of wonder, and for eyes opened to see God’s gracious ways in our world.

-Jay Sidebotham

Suggested spiritual exercise for this week:
Read Psalm 119 in one sitting.

Good news

Aren’t you ready for some good news? What would it sound like?

Tomorrow the church observes the feast of St. Mark the Evangelist, credited with authorship of the earliest and shortest of the four gospels. I’m thinking Mark would have loved Twitter. He has no time to waste. No flowery text. No over-verbalizing. Every other word in the gospel is “immediately.”

He gets right to the point as he begins his gospel: “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” He’s telling reader where the story is headed. The gospel ends with Jesus instructing his disciples to go out and spread good news. In other words, Mark is living into the wisdom of teachers in many fields. He tells you what he is going to tell you. He then tells you. After that, he tells you what he told you.

He writes a gospel. The word “gospel” really means good news. He is called an evangelist. The root of that word, evangel, means good news.

Are we getting the point? If the story of Jesus is about anything, it is about good news. The urgency in Mark’s style reminds us that we live in a world literally and figuratively dying for good news. Given that context, if our faith is not about good news, why bother?

But in poll after poll, when people outside the church are asked for association with the word “Christian”, the news is not good. What apparently comes to mind are words like self-righteous, hypocritical, bigoted, boring. Does that surprise you? In the first century, people outside the church observed the church and said “See how they love one another.” Today, folks might say: “See how they judge one another.” Or maybe: “See how the church is the place where fun goes to die.”

We need to get back to the good news. Think of a time when you heard really good news. When my son was born in a New York hospital, I was sent home to fetch stuff, a walk of a number of long city blocks. At every corner, waiting for the light to change, I told perfect strangers that I was now a father, and in fact, that the most adorable baby ever born had just arrived at St. Vincent’s Hospital. The irrepressible good news was new life. I confess I’ve never been that effusive about my spiritual life. It’s private, personal and after all, I’m Episcopalian.

One preacher made the point that we have no problem telling other people about a great book, restaurant, or movie we have discovered. But when it comes to the good news of the Spirit, we often go silent.

Sure, there is good reason for that. We all know evangelism gone amok, evangelism that does more harm than good, evangelism that is really bad news. Maybe even fake news.

But that doesn’t remove the question: How would we describe the good news of our faith? What language would we borrow? For me, the good news sounds something like this. We are loved, as is. We are blessed. We are in this together. We are forgiven. Our mistakes and sins don’t define us. There is always a way back. Life is shot through with beauty and meaning. Life is found when we give it away. Healing happens. There is hope. We are not alone. God, for some mysterious reason, chooses to use us. Love wins. Or as we might say at Easter, a dead end becomes a threshold, a tomb bursts with life. Heaven happens. It will be a place of healing, especially of those relationships I messed up and never resolved.

So what is the good news for you? This Monday morning, I invite and maybe challenge you to think about how you would articulate the good news of your faith. Because we live in a world that really needs to hear some good news.

-Jay Sidebotham

Suggested spiritual exercise for this week: Take an hour in a quiet corner and read the whole gospel of Mark. Read it in one sitting. When you’re done, ask yourself: What’s the good news here?

Contact:
Rev. Jay Sidebotham
jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement.
www.renewalworks.org

If you’d like to join in this donor-based ministry, donate here.

Alleluia already

So I made it through Lent without this particular liturgical lapse. I never said the A-word in church. That has not always been the case in years past.

Our tradition asks us to put the word “Alleluia” away for the season, to go through Lent without saying the Hebrew word which means “God be praised.” There’s good reason for that. The somber, penitential, occasionally more-miserable-than-thou season stands in contrast to the joy and celebration of Easter, the season of resurrection when we say the “Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia.”

Having noted all that, had I been consulted when the design team got together to create liturgical customs (good thing I wasn’t), I might have said that we need to say “Alleluia” all year long. Perhaps we especially need the A-word when we’re mindful of the brokenness of our world and of our own spirits, the mindfulness that accompanies Lent.

I’m not alone in thinking this. Ten days ago, my wife and I heard Anne Lamott speak. One of my spiritual guides, she has come out with a new book entitled Hallelujah Anyway: Rediscovering Mercy. The title is taken from a gospel song by Candi Stanton, which according to Ms. Lamott says that “in spite of it all, there is love, there is singing, nature, laughing, mercy…As Father Ed Dowling said, sometimes heaven is just a new pair of glasses. When we put them on, we see the awful person, sometimes even ourselves, a bit more gently and we are blessed in return…The good news is that God has such low standards and reaches out to those of us who are often not lovable and offers us a chance to come back in from the storm of drama and toxic thoughts.” That good news causes us to say hallelujah anyway.

Two other spiritual guides, Joan Chittister and Rowan Williams touched on the same theme when they wrote a book together a few years ago. It’s called Uncommon Gratitude: Alleluia For All That Is. Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams often says that, no matter what, the proper stance of the Christian in the world is one of gratitude. No matter what. Joan Chittister introduces the book by saying that she and the Archbishop agreed on this: “Life itself is an exercise in learning to sing alleluia here in order to recognize the face of God hidden in the recesses of time. To deal with the meaning of alleluias in life means to deal with moments that do not feel like alleluia moments at all. But how is it possible to say alleluia to the parts of life that weigh us down, that drain our spirits dry, that seem to deserve anything but praise?” Good questions. Good answers in their book.

Finally, wisdom from one more spiritual guide, Elie Wiesel, survivor of concentration camps. Here’s part of what he said when he received the Nobel Prize for his writing: “No one is as capable of gratitude as one who has emerged from the kingdom of night. We know that every moment is a moment of grace, every hour an offering: not to share them means to betray them. Our lives no longer belong to us alone; they belong to all those who need us desperately. And that is why I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” Mr. Wiesel teaches that an attitude of gratitude, which sees every moment as a moment of grace, has power to change the world, and of course reminds us that we say “alleluia” not only with our lips but with our lives, not only in good times but in bad.

So on this first Monday in the Easter season, whatever it is you face, joy and challenge, cost and promise, make it your practice to say hallelujah anyway. Alleluia for all that is. Recognize every moment as a moment of grace. Alleluia already.

-Jay Sidebotham

Contact:
Rev. Jay Sidebotham
jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement.
www.renewalworks.org

If you’d like to join in this donor-based ministry, donate here.

A few years ago, a colleague went to see the musical Jesus Christ Superstar. The next morning he showed up at church to recount his experience. He had been seated in the second row of the mezzanine. Right in front of him sat a family with children of middle school age. As the musical unfolded, they followed closely in the program. It apparently was totally new material for all of them, parent and child alike. So who is this Pilate guy? Whose side is Judas on? And Herod? Are they good guys or bad guys? What did Jesus do that made everyone so mad? And why does Mary Magdalene sing that sweet, sad song?

Somewhat smugly, the group of church folks sat around a conference table clucking about the signs of the times. The old, old story we knew so well was, well, not well known in many quarters. For many, it may not be an old story at all. Perhaps that’s a failure, with blame to be assigned any number of places. Perhaps it’s an opportunity.

As we begin this week, try this. Join that family in the front row of the mezzanine. Imagine you’ve never heard the story of Holy Week before. With a nod to Marcus J. Borg, quoted below, hear the story, read the Bible, meet Jesus again, walk through Holy Week as if for the first time. There are a couple ways to do that.

To begin, read the story. Set aside time with the gospel passage assigned for each day of Holy Week. If you’re not sure where to find those readings, go here. You’ll find readings for Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, insights into events that lead to stories told on Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Day. These include the last supper, Jesus’ prayers in the garden, Jesus’ arrest and execution, his burial and finally the good news of Easter. Try this act of imagination. Wonder what it would be like to read this material for the first time. Ask God to give you new eyes.

Second, get to church. Make a commitment to walk through the week by participating in liturgies offered each day. Imagine you’d never been to those services before. What do you notice? What is perplexing? What touches your heart? They have been polished over centuries. As they tell the story, they build on each other to dramatic effect. The experience of Easter will be richer for having joined other pilgrims on the week-long journey. Discover something new, something you haven’t seen before. If you’re not part of a faith community that offers these services, find one. As the prayer for today (below) indicates, that journey may well help you find the way of life and peace.

And finally, be of service. Make this Holy Week holier in this way: Ask God each morning to place before you an opportunity to reflect the love of God at the heart of this week. As hymnody tells us, this week is about asking the question: What wondrous love is this? It is about surveying a wondrous cross where love and sorrow flow mingled down. It is about singing a song of love unknown. It is about coming to know that love in some new way. In the mystery of our faith, the mystery of this week, we come to know that love when we show that love.

I offer these Monday Matters each week in the confidence that Monday is the day we get to put faith to work in the world. This Monday matters more than most, as it begins our most Holy Week. Join me in praying that for each of us and all of us it will be an occasion to experience grace and mercy in some new way, to find that the way of the cross is actually the way of life and peace.

-Jay Sidebotham

Contact:
Rev. Jay Sidebotham
jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement.
www.renewalworks.org

If you’d like to join in this donor-based ministry, donate here.

Estimable/Inestimable

Last Wednesday, I joined parishioners for our Wednesday Lenten Program. It began with the liturgy for Evening Prayer, Rite I. (Not a place I visit often. I go more often to Rite II. ) That liturgy includes one of my favorite prayers, the General Thanksgiving (included below).

From my perspective, that prayer sums up the faith. It says that everything we do should be motivated by gratitude for grace, that we worship not only with our lips but with our lives. I’ve often thought that the prayer should be said along side the creed, maybe occasionally in place of it. The prayer includes many a great phrase, for instance, the call to be unfeignedly thankful. Love that. And then there is this reference (in Rite II language) to God’s immeasurable love.

Here’s what caught my eye last Wednesday. In Rite I, the word immeasurable is rendered inestimable. I began to think about what inestimable love means. I wondered what estimable love would look like. So I let Webster help. Here’s the definition of estimable:

1. capable of being estimated, as in “an estimable amount”
2. valuable (archaic)
3. worthy of esteem, as in “an estimable adversary”

I’m focusing on the first definition, i.e., something that can be estimated. Which means something that can be measured. Which means something limited. Working with that definition, I suspect we all know about estimable love.

We know estimable love because we all give and receive conditional, transactional love. That kind of love can be seen at work and in school, where our worth is defined by productivity or grades. It shows up in relationships. How many times have people said that they hadn’t earned approval of parents (or sometimes children). Advertisers know about estimable love and play on our fears that we won’t measure up. Do we look the part? Conditional love shows up in the Bible. The children of Israel, wander in the wilderness and worship God as long as things are going swell. As soon as they hit a challenge, they’re ready to bail asking “What have you done for me lately?’ Conditional love shows up in church life. Clergy know it, judged by best recent sermon, weekly attendance, number of pledging units, seamlessness of the liturgy. What are the trends? Is flat the new up? One slightly tired bishop counseled me early in my ministry: You dance. They clap.

The scriptures tell us that the love of God is different. In the letter to the Ephesians, the author offers this prayer: I pray that you may have power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3)

Even in situations when the love of God is hard to see (For instance, last week, a bus filled with Baptist senior citizens crashing on a Texas highway), by faith we affirm its inestimable, immeasurable character. We need to affirm it. It’s sometimes the only way to move forward. In his letter to the Romans, in a passage often read at funerals, Paul puts it this way: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword…No, in all those things we are more than conquerors through him who love us, for I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8).

As we move into Holy Week, we have opportunity to focus on our central narrative, which is a story of inestimable love. We’ll sing a song of love unknown. We’ll ask: What wondrous love is this? We’ll survey the wondrous cross, where sorrow and love flow mingled down. We’ll remember, we’ll celebrate inestimable, immeasurable love, love which makes a difference in the ways we live our lives, maybe even making a difference this Monday morning.

-Jay Sidebotham

Contact:
Rev. Jay Sidebotham
jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement.
www.renewalworks.org

If you’d like to join in this donor-based ministry, donate here.

“I may not be much but I’m all I ever think about.”

I heard that line for the first time last week. Google reveals it’s been around for a while. I couldn’t find out who first said it, but it triggered a few reflections.

It reminded me of a clip from a movie featuring Bette Midler. She says to some other character, “Enough about me, let’s talk about you. What do you think of me?” It reminded me of what a friend once pointed out: When you look at a group photo, and you happen to be in the group, where do your eyes go first? You look at how you look in the picture. It reminded me of what Frederick Buechner wrote about humility, that illusive virtue that disappears as soon as we become aware of it, bringing that temptation to be proud of how humble we are. Buechner wrote:

Humility is often confused with saying you’re not much of a bridge player when you know perfectly well you are. Conscious or otherwise, this kind of humility is a form of gamesmanship. If you really aren’t much of a bridge player, you’re apt to be rather proud of yourself for admitting it so humbly. This kind of humility is a form of low comedy. True humility doesn’t consist of thinking ill of yourself but of not thinking of yourself much differently from the way you’d be apt to think of anybody else. It is the capacity for being no more and no less pleased when you play your own hand well than when your opponents do.

Mr. Buechner challenges us to question the way we think about what’s in our hearts. There aren’t easy answers. This is a spiritual issue. It’s been said that the word “ego” is really an acronym: edging God out. This calls for spiritual work. It’s complicated, because as I’ve said before, quoting a clergyman I admire, I never met a motive that wasn’t mixed. Amidst the mixed motives, how do we combat the tendency to think that it’s all about me? (Newsflash: It’s a tendency that is a particular challenge for clergy, among other professions. Just saying.)

For those who try to be Jesus followers, it has to do with having the mind of Christ. See the passage from Philippians below. That passage includes an ancient hymn by which the early church figured out how to put faith to work in the world. It comes with seeing Jesus as a person for others, and deciding to follow him by doing the same: being a person for others. Maybe begin each day with this thought, a kind of prayer: How can I be of service this Monday?

As Lent leads to Holy Week, we have opportunity to put other concerns aside and focus on the spirit of Jesus, who rides humbly into Jerusalem, not in imperial chariot but on a donkey, who kneels to wash disciples feet, who stretches arms of love on the hard wood of the cross to draw us into saving embrace, who on Easter morning is mistaken for a gardener and speaks Mary’s name so she can know he is alive. Take this holy season as opportunity to shift the focus from self to other, to think about how to be of service. It’s a way to find out that Jesus is very much alive.

-Jay Sidebotham

Contact:
Rev. Jay Sidebotham
jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement.
www.renewalworks.org

If you’d like to join in this donor-based ministry, donate here.

Setting the Table

For a while, I worked in advertising, before I made the slight career shift to ordained ministry. (Some say I’m still in advertising.) Some have doubted there could be transferable skills from the first career to the second. But I’m grateful for what I learned: the importance of communication, the power of focus on a single idea, the importance of team work. One of my bosses said that there were really only two motivators for consumers: fear and love. That will preach.

The fact is, there are lessons for the spiritual journey that come from all kinds of fields. St. Paul wrote to early Christians and compared the life of discipleship to training in military service, or preparing for a long distance race, or being in the construction business (what foundation will you build on?), or agricultural work (also a favorite of Jesus’).

My gifted cousin and her husband are about to open a wonderful café here in North Carolina. I can’t wait. To guide them in their work, they have turned to a book by restaurateur Danny Meyer. The book is called Setting the Table. It’s a book focused on hospitality, on how we prepare to welcome people. In the past, I’ve used this book to learn about what it means to be church. In that book, Mr. Meyer identifies five core emotional skills which guide his work, and will guide my cousin in her new endeavor:

• Optimistic warmth: genuine kindness, thoughtfulness and a sense that the glass is always half-full.
• Intelligence: Not just smarts, but an insatiable curiosity to learn for the sake of learning.
• Work ethic: A natural tendency to do something as well as it can be done.
• Empathy: An awareness of, care for, and connection to how others feel and how your actions make others feel.
• Self-awareness and integrity: An understanding of what makes you tick and a natural inclination to be accountable for doing the right thing with honesty and superb judgment.

Those five skills led to remarkable successful restaurants in New York and around the country. Can those skills be translated into Christian virtues, spiritual practices? Let’s give it a try:

• Optimistic warmth: Sounds a lot to me like hope.
• Intelligence: What is a disciple but someone who is always learning, and who knows, especially in the spiritual journey, that we’re never done?
• Work ethic: A mentor used to tell me that we seek to make worship our most excellent offering. That doesn’t mean it’s perfect or that we become perfectionists. It does mean that we do what we do with care, as an offering to the God we worship for the glory of God. Should we offer less?
• Empathy: Just another word for love, or perhaps, compassion, the common virtue in all faith traditions.
• Self-awareness and integrity: it looks a lot like humility to me.
• Setting the table: That’s what the church is about, getting ready to welcome people to God’s feast. That’s what the individual spiritual journey is about, as we relate to those around us in a world so hungry for a greater sense of authentic hospitality.

This Monday, this Lent, how can we set the table with hope and love, in a spirit of worship and humility, as disciples who are always learning?

-Jay Sidebotham

Contact:
Rev. Jay Sidebotham
jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement.
www.renewalworks.org

If you’d like to join in this donor-based ministry, donate here.

Spring Training

A nod to Saturday Night Live: I confess that Lent is often for me the “Debby Downer” of liturgical seasons, 40 days when I’m supposed to feel more miserable than thou, when I’m called to live into the definition of a puritan, i.e., someone who is unhappy because somebody somewhere is having a good time. Religious people have a special talent for this kind of joy-deprived way of life. No doubt, Lent is a time to take a rigorous look in the mirror, which can often call us to explore growth opportunities revealed in self-examination. It can be rough going.

But the word Lent finds roots in the old English word for “Spring.” Lent is for sure a time in the wilderness, a time of challenge, maybe even deprivation. It’s a time to admit that we have fallen short. But that wilderness is also a time of formation. Scripture tells us that it led the children of Israel to a new land, a new world.

Lent leads us to new life, as well. Its connection with springtime means that it draws our attention to signs of new life all around us. An extra hour of sunlight in the evening. (Did you all get to church on time yesterday, or did you arrive for the dismissal?) Trees beginning to blossom (though yesterday in North Carolina we had snow). And of course, Spring training.

Which reminds me of a favorite quote about baseball, which has something to say not only about the joys and challenges of Lent, but about the spiritual journey. Hear this word from former baseball commissioner, Francis T. Vincent, Jr.:

Baseball teaches us how to deal with failure. We learn at a very young age that failure is the norm in baseball, and precisely because we have failed, we hold in high regard those who fail less often – those who hit safely in one out of three chances and become star players. I also find it fascinating that baseball, alone in sport, considers error to be part of the game, part of its rigorous truth.

The Christian faith is good news because in its rigorous truth, it recognizes that we are not perfect. Denial of that truth doesn’t help anyone. The baptismal covenant speaks of the opportunity to return, whenever we sin, not if ever. St. Paul reminds us that we have all fallen short of the glory of God, but also reminds us that we can never be separated from God’s love. What part of never do we not understand?

The gospel invites us to rely not on our ability to get it right all the time (to bat 1000. Who can do that?) Rather, it invites us to rely on grace and mercy, and to show our dependence on grace and mercy by showing grace and mercy to others.

It’s a process, a journey for sure. A wise parishioner described the process this way: Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from poor judgment.

As disciples, we are learners, on a journey or continuum calling us to be more and more like Christ. How will you reflect on that journey this Monday morning? Maybe you can use the prayer for young persons (below). Note how that prayer speaks of the gift of failure. And as you do, as you observe this Holy Lent, also note that Spring is in the air.

-Jay Sidebotham

I spent Ash Wednesday in Manhattan. In a nostalgic moment, I stopped in at a church where I had served, a big place on a big New York avenue, with an aisle about the length of a football field. As in many churches, ashes were being imposed all day long. I sat and watched a steady stream of New Yorkers in glorious diversity, a vision of the kingdom of God, coming to receive ashes and to be told they were dust. It caused me to recall times when I had stood up front and imposed ashes as part of my ministry in that church.

We offered ashes continuously from 7am to 7pm. One year, I had the last hour-long shift. At about 6:59, we were ready to call it a day, I spied a young businessman, dark three piece suit, attaché case in tow, sprinting pell-mell down the aisle. When he got to me, I told him: “Relax. Take a deep breath. I’m not going anywhere.” He looked at me as he kneeled and said: “You don’t understand. I gotta make this quick. I’m double-parked.” Ashes delivered, he sprinted back down the aisle.

As I watched him, I thought he was trying to do what we all try to do: Fit a spiritual life into a full life. Not always easy to do.

As I enter into conversations with congregations about spiritual growth, about what helps spiritual growth happen and what gets in the way, one of the persistent answers I hear when I ask about obstacles to spiritual growth: the busy lives we lead. That can happen in church, where too often we confuse church activity with a deepening relationship with God.

My current work with congregations is based on insights from a huge, bustling, seemingly successful congregation, thousands in regular attendance. The church had grown, based on this model: More church activity = greater spiritual growth. But was that true? This church discovered, after many years, that the model was flawed. Many of the most active, many of the busiest folks in church were spiritually stalled, depleted, annoyed, thinking of leaving, done. So why am I telling you this on this Monday morning?

Lent is a season for spiritual growth. That growth may have a lot to do with the less we do. I know well that for many churches, programming cranks up at this time of year. I don’t wish to discourage participation. But maybe giving up something for Lent will have to do with clearing something from the calendar, carving out time for silence, prayer that involves more listening and fewer instructions to the Almighty.

I commend a book by Bill Hybels called Simplify. It points to the spiritual growth that comes by rigorous assessment of very full lives, an attempt to simplify what we make too complicated, doing fewer things better. Speaking from my experience, activity (especially religious activity) may be an attempt to prove to God that we are worthy of attention. God is not impressed. The fact is, the gospel is that we are already beloved.

Saints of our tradition knew this, making time for silence, for prayer, following our Lord’s example. I’m always amazed at the number of times we read in the gospels that Jesus goes off for solitude and prayer. Didn’t he realize how much he had to do to save the world in three years? Martin Luther was asked how he could spend so much time in prayer when he had all of Europe to reform. He said: “I have so much to do each day that I shall spend the first three hours in prayer.” In their collaborative book, The Book of Joy, Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama playfully compete about who wakes up the earliest to pray (The Archbishop at 4am, the Dalai Lama at 3am).

So how about you? Take the gift of Lent as a chance to simplify, to be quiet, to listen to what the Spirit is saying. You may have to be quite intentional about it. It may be inconvenient. It may seem outwardly unproductive. It may be counter-cultural, and even get you in trouble.

But try it, even if you get a ticket for being double-parked. It’s worth it.

-Jay Sidebotham

Contact:
Rev. Jay Sidebotham
jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement.
www.renewalworks.org

If you’d like to join in this donor-based ministry, donate here.

Continuing education

Among the many things for which I’m grateful these days is the chance to roam around the church (courtesy of American Airlines) and learn. Learning is what disciples are supposed to do, I think. I’m learning that learning never stops.

I had the chance to learn from Stephen Cottrell, Bishop of Chelmsford, England, who preached at the National Cathedral last Thursday night. With impeccable timing of finest comedians (Colbert, Stewart, Fallon watch out!), he spoke about evangelism. He highlighted something I’d never noticed, which is that at the heart of the word “evangelism” (a word which makes many Episcopalians nervous) is the word “angel”. The word “angel” really means messenger.

He shared stories of evangelism, times when he was a messenger, including a moment sharing his faith while ordering coffee. His clerical collar gave him away as he waited in line. Another caffeine-deprived consumer asked about his vocation. After she had done some quizzing about what had caused him to become a priest, she offered her own take on church people. From her point of view (i.e., millennial outside the church), they could be divided into two groups:

The first kind of Christian, she observed, treated Christianity like a hobby, like gardening or bridge or macramé. Nothing wrong with it, but nothing transformational, either. Nothing that seemed to make a huge difference in life. “Why bother?” might be an appropriate response.

The second kind of Christian holds faith so tightly that it scares off anyone nearby. It’s that vociferous, occasionally angry, annoying, self-righteous embrace of faith. I suspect you know what I’m talking about. If you don’t, you are blessed. To my mind, if that’s the good news (which is what “evangel” really means), I’d hate to hear the bad news. I have a friend who said she’d start jogging when people who were jogging looked like they were having fun. Perhaps the same could be true of religious folks, who often specialize in being more miserable than thou.

In response to his coffee companion, this winning bishop posited a third way (thanks be to God). He described it as the way of Jesus, the way of justice, peace, and joy. Standing in line, waiting for his latte, he told this young woman about a way that breaks down barriers, and tears down walls in a world that seems bent on building them. He spoke of a way that brings a sense of the abundance of life that Jesus showed and shared.

And he gave this young woman this piece of advice: Go to your local church and find out what it is to be fully human. Go and find out what it means to live life as God intended life to be, life shown to us in Jesus Christ. Does your church help you do that? Can you help your church help to do that?

It was a moment of evangelism. Maybe the bishop was the angel, the messenger. Maybe she was. It doesn’t really matter, because good news was shared. It began with the bishop listening to this woman he just met, valuing her insights, honoring the truth she knew, learning from her. That listening is key to evangelism.

He moved then with courage to proclaim that the gospel is good news, that it can help us become all that God intends. He presented the gospel as news that God’s greatest joy is to help us realize our original blessing. Too often church fails to do that. But in my travels, I’m learning that it can happen. That’s been a great lesson.

Today is February 27. The day is a gift. How will you be an evangelist, a listener, a proclaimer of good news, a messenger, an angel? And how would you like your coffee?

-Jay Sidebotham

The glory of God is the human person fully alive.

-St. Irenaeus

I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

-Jesus (John 10:10)

An oldie but a goodie:

I love to tell the story of unseen things above, of Jesus and His glory, of Jesus and His love; I love to tell the story, because I know ’tis true. It satisfies my longings as nothing else would do.

Refrain:

I love to tell the story,

‘Twill be my theme in glory, to tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love.

I love to tell the story, more wonderful it seems than all the golden fancies of all our golden dreams;

I love to tell the story, it did so much for me,

And that is just the reason I tell it now to thee.

I love to tell the story, for those who know it best seem hungering and thirsting to hear it like the rest; And when in scenes of glory I sing the new, new song, ’twill be the old, old story that I have loved so long.

“I Love to Tell the Story,” Words: A. Katherine Hankey (1831-1911)

Contact:
Rev. Jay Sidebotham
jsidebotham@renewalworks.org
RenewalWorks is a ministry of Forward Movement.
www.renewalworks.org

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